How To Identify Door Orientations

In this video, we will demonstrate how to identify the orientation of your security steel door.

When determining your door hinge side and opening, the orientation is dictated by the view of the door from the outside. For single doors, the hinge side determines which side the hinges are on, regardless of whether it opens inwards or outwards. From the outside, the latching side is on the opposite side. Here we can see from looking at the exterior of the door that the hinge is visible on the left, and the handle is on the right-hand side of the door leaf. This identifies it as a left-handed door opening outwards.

For the opposite, the hinge is visible on the right, and the handle is on the left-hand side of the door leaf, showing it as a right-handed door opening outwards. If the door were to be open inward, then the hinge shouldn’t be visible from the external view. In this example from the exterior of the door, no hinge is visible,e and the door handle is located on the left side of the leaf. This makes the door orientation right-handed opening inwards. Again, for the opposite, if no hinge is visible, and the door handle is located on the right side of the leaf, then this orientation is left-handed opening inwards.

For double door orientation, identify the active leaf. Look for the door that has a locking mechanism installed. This door is designed to open first, distinguishing it from the passive leaf.

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